Corpus Christi, Enthroning the Lord

On the Feast of Corpus Christ we commemorate the great gift of God to mere mortals, the banquet of immortality. This God of Love chose to give Himself fully and completely to you and me. In and through His Son Jesus Christ, God feeds us in the most Holy Eucharist and transforms us into His image. He then reaches out through us to embrace a world that He loves. He gathers that world back to Himself through the ongoing mediation and mission of the Church, which is the new world, renewed in His very life-giving Spirit. The same God who fed His chosen people Israel manna in the desert, satisfying their physical hunger, gives the Living Bread, the Eucharist, to satisfy the deepest spiritual hunger of every man, woman and child. In the Eucharist we receive the Lord Jesus’ Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, heavenly provision and eternal food for our earthly journey. The great Western theologian, Thomas Aquinas wrote, “Material food first of all turns itself into the person who eats it and as a consequence, restores his losses and increases his vital energies. Spiritual food, on the other hand, turns the person who eats it into Itself, and thus the proper effect of this sacrament is the conversion of man into Christ, so that he may no longer live for himself, but that Christ may live in him. And as a consequence, it has the double effect of restoring the spiritual losses caused by sins and defects and of increasing the power of the virtues.” Our participation in the Eucharist is a communion in the very inner life of God. It is a call to participate in the transfiguration of the world. When we feed on this heavenly food, the Lord comes to dwell within us and makes us like Himself. We then give thanks by living our lives differently. That is what the word Eucharist literally means, “thanksgiving”. We have received the Living Bread from heaven. Let us now become what we consume, enthroning the Lord as King of our daily lives in the world.